Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Day 5: Classy, Vintage Cocktail Dress

There is just something about the word "cocktail" that I love. It makes the idea of drinking an adult beverage so much more appealing and classy-sounding than the simple "drink." Numerous restaurants and bars have already figured this out; that if you throw "cocktail" onto a menu or on the end of a drink's name, then you can up the price about $5.

That is what you get for image, I suppose, which also brings me to the discussion on my #2 find: the silk vintage cocktail dress.

What do the increased costs of drinks labeled cocktails have to do with vintage thrifted dresses? Well, one of the frustrations about thrifting in this day and age is that some thrift stores ridiculously inflate the prices of pieces in their "vintage"* section**. While we have discussed the freak economics of resale clothing in the past, this sort of "keeping up with the joneses" of thrift stores pretty much ruins much of what is so exciting about thrifting.

One such store was the second Fox Valley Thrift Shoppe we visited during our BLACK FRIDAY THRIFTING trip. I ended up trying on approximately a fourth of their vintage section, but only came way with this piece, partially because some pieces didn't fit, and partially because most of the prices I couldn't justify paying. I did throw down $13 for this number, however, because it has an amazing fit, has very little damage to it (only a small hole in the armpit), is made of great fabric and is rather unique with the weird painterly floral sash thing going on.

That is the problem with thrifting—even though $13 is a HUGE amount of money to spend on one piece, sometimes you will find something that you can't justify passing up. Passing on a great piece becomes even more difficult when you figure in the fact that this dress would cost much more than that at any number of vintage resale shops. So, it is a win-win.

I was going to wear this to my work holiday party, with a lot of Amy Winehouse-style make-up, but the huge snowstorm a few weeks back squashed that dream. Now I might just have to settle for debuting it at something a bit more classy, like a key party at my friends Sarah and Tim's new mid century modern house.

*I say "vintage" in quotes because these sections often also include large amounts of clothing that mimics the traditional dress of various immigrant populations in which ever area you are thrifting in.**Jury's still out on whether or not a thrift store having a "vintage section" is positive or negative. Thoughts on this?